It is often desirable and/or necessary for safety and health reasons for an individual to control their body temperature to a comfortable level in the external environment relative to that individual that is warmer than individual desires. This is especially true in the situation wherein the individual must remain in the uncomfortably warm external environment for any length of time due to the type of activity that they are engaged in. These activities can range from being at an outdoor concert or event, engaging in physically active activities in the warm external environment such as running, jogging, walking, playing various sports, bicycling, motorcycling, or any other similar type activity that the individual is engaged in of necessity is in the undesirably warm external environment. Typically, in the above situation, conventional refrigerant type air conditioning is either unavailable or inefficient in the sense that the refrigerant type air conditioning equipment's large size, heavy weight, having risks with the environment concerning CFC's and HCFC's, and significant electrical power requirements needed are not practical to be utilized, as the individual can very likely be located outside in the external environment in a remote/rural geographic area. Thus, for the individual to remain comfortably cool in the aforementioned environmental conditions an apparatus must be portable, in other words small in size, small in weight, and require minimal electrical power. Additionally, it is preferable that the portable cooling apparatus be simple in design, such that a minimum of parts and controls are utilized for better reliability and again contributing to minimal size and weight as desirable features. This naturally leads to evaporative water cooling which currently is utilized in two forms, either water soaking a porous pad material wherein a fan forces air flow through the pad, with the evaporative effect of the water in the pad resulting in cool feeling humid air discharging from the pad. The other form is using mist cooling wherein high pressure water at a very low flow rate is discharged through a nozzle that creates a very fine atomized mist that cools the ambient air in close proximity to the nozzle and when the fine mist comes into contact with an individual the quick evaporation of the mist has a cooling effect upon the individual. The preferred evaporative cooling system that is for the use of an individual being highly portable for size, weight, and electrical power consumption reasons is the nozzle that creates a very fine atomized mist, which is commonly used on outdoor patios, spectator stands at sport events, and the like. Other advantages of the nozzle mist system especially for an individual in an outside environment are that the size and weight of the system can be kept minimal, there are low power requirements, and there are no environmental issues with CFC's and HCFC's.
The need for a portable individual cooling system is somewhat recognized in the prior art although most of the systems are hindered in their effectiveness by the total lack of electrical power available, requiring batteries, which add size and weight, and also having a limited useful life, or having the need to generate the electrical power or directly drive a pump, for instance from the wheel of a bicycle, or utilize a manual hand pump, all of which of course causes an individual to generate more metabolic heat in the undesirably warm external environment, thus requiring even more cooling from the system that is limited in its cooling capabilities in the first place. A first example is given in U.S. Pat. No. 6,196,474 to Hillerson that discloses a pressurized bicyclist water spraying apparatus that is adapted to be mounted on a bicycle, wherein the apparatus utilizes a conventional bicycle head and tail light generator that is driven off the bicycle wheel which in turn provides electric power for an electric pump which is really acting as a compressor to pressurize the interior of a reservoir with air. Hillerson further discloses that the air pressurized reservoir (which also desirably requires a pressure relief valve) will allow a flow of water to be communicated to a nozzle that provides a stream of fluid to the bicycle rider that apparently the bicyclist either drinks the spray of water or soaks themselves with the spray of water for a refreshing/cooling effect. In addition, Hillerson teaches an optional electric small capacity fan that is positioned such that the fan helps direct the spray of water toward the bicycle rider. Hillerson does not address the capacity issue with the reservoir being partially filled with pressurized air with the remaining portion of the reservoir being filled with water, wherein once the bicycle rider receives an initial spray of water there is apparently some amount of recharge time required for the air compressor to recharge the reservoir with air pressure to enable the bicyclist to receive another spray of water. This makes the utility of the Hillerson apparatus marginal not only as water sprays must be occasional time wise, also that dousing the bicycle rider with the water spray may not always be desirable as the bicycle riders clothing and shoes would eventually be soaked with water and when combined with Hillerson's complexity does not result in an optimal apparatus for cooling the bicycle rider.
Further, in U.S. Pat. No. 4,815,635 to Porter disclosed is a bicyclist water supply apparatus that by utilizing a manually operated hand diaphragm pump delivers a spray of cooling water from a first reservoir again similar to Hillerson to douse the bicycle rider with the spray of water or in the alternative by use of a valve selectable second reservoir to deliver a spray of a desired solution other than water to drink for the bicycle rider. In addition to the previously mentioned problems of Hillerson, Porter requires that the bicycle rider be distracted from their attention to the road to enable them to manually hand pump the diaphragm pump, which further reduces the bicycle rider safety. Continuing, and in a sense of combining Hillerson and Porter in U.S. Pat. No. 4,807,813 to Coleman disclosed is a bicycle having a tire driven pump, as opposed to Hillersons's tire driven generator, wherein Coleman has the tire driven pump draw from a handlebar mounted reservoir, however, with the pump discharge being mounted on the helmet of the bicycle rider to be used as it water toy. Coleman states that the objective of invention is to promote helmet use for the bicycle rider, resulting in this invention not having any bicycle rider cooling or refreshment capabilities. Yet further, in the bicycle water gun area in U.S. design Pat. No. D381,711 to Englert disclosed is a handlebar mounted water gun nozzle that in addition has a rearward facing water gun nozzle that utilizes a bicycle frame mounted reservoir and pump. Englert in being similar to Coleman solely discloses a water gun or water toy that is strictly for bicycle rider amusement and does not teach either cooling or refreshment of the bicycle rider.
In moving away from the prior art water spray systems adapted to be attached to bicycles in U.S. Pat. No. 5,967,415 to Utter disclosed is a portable mist cooling device that is adapted to be attached to an individual via a belt, that utilizes a pressurized container with a valve that allows the release of fluid from the container and a spray nozzle that is in fluid communication with the valve, the spray nozzle can be directed anywhere the individual desires. Utter creates pressure within the container by the use of a manually operated hand air pump operated by the individual wearing the portable mist cooling device, of course Utter suffers from some of the same shortcomings as Porter in requiring the individual to manually pump the device to receive the water spray not being much different than a conventional plastic spray bottle. Continuing, in U.S. Pat. No. 6,182,463B1 to Strussion et al., disclosed is a portable evaporative cooling apparatus that includes a fan for generating an airflow over a set of water spray nozzles that are fed by a separate water pump and reservoir. Thus, Strussion et al., recognizes that the evaporative cooling effect is enhanced from the fan that generates the airflow and also the beneficial evaporative cooling effect of having the water at a lower temperature as opposed to a higher temperature which is especially important in exterior environments that tend to be more humid which lessens the effectiveness of the cooling effect of evaporative cooling systems, thus having cooler water pumped into the water spray nozzles in more humid exterior environments attempts to regain a portion of the cooling effectiveness of evaporative cooling systems. However, Strussion et al., is not really portable in that the apparatus requires utility (110 VAC) electrical power to operate.
Continuing further, for the application of an evaporative cooling water mist system to a golf cart in U.S. Pat. No. 5,613,371 to Nelson disclosed is a method and apparatus for misting vehicle occupants that includes a fluid reservoir that is in fluid communication with a pump which in turn forces water into an accumulator until a desired pressure is attained within the accumulator, wherein the system is activated by opening a solenoid valve to release the pressurized water in the accumulator that is in fluid communication with the misting nozzles. Nelson utilizes the accumulator to trap air to store energy for supplying the water to the misting nozzles that is under a substantially constant pressure, as the accumulator is implemented to reduce the pressure and flow pulsation to the misting nozzles. However, in Nelson the use of the accumulator and solenoid further complicates the water mist system, that serves to recognize the problem inherent in all cooling water mist system is in that the misting nozzles typically have extremely small orifices that act to take the liquid water flow upstream of the nozzle and turned it into a finely atomized water mist by creating a significant pressure drop of the liquid water flow thereby converting the liquid water flow into almost a gas like state that lends itself to rapid evaporation. Thus, Nelson identifies an issue in the use finely atomizing water mist nozzles in that these nozzles typically have an orifice diameter of about 0.008 inches that nominally allow only about 1.25 gallons of water per hour at a differential pressure of 1000 pounds per square inch.
Generally speaking from a fluid dynamics standpoint this results in that it is significantly difficult to find a water pump that can operate at a flow rate of 1.25 gallons of water per hour while generating 1000 pounds per square inch of pressure with the pump drawing from an atmospheric pressure water reservoir. In other words, the aforementioned flow rate is extremely low in combination with the aforementioned pressure that is extremely high. To meet these pumping requirements it is normally required to use a positive displacement type pump, such as a piston pump, or a diaphragm pump, or the like that are complex and expensive in addition to creating a pulsating discharge flow, wherein a pulsating discharge flow it is undesirable from the atomizing water mist nozzles as the mist will tend to “spit” at the individual. To overcome this problem from a fluid dynamic standpoint several solutions are typically used, firstly an accumulator can be utilized to decouple the pump output from the mist flow, this is accomplished by keeping the accumulator partially full of water from a pump wherein another portion of the accumulator contains a pressurized air filled bladder that keeps the water under pressure in the accumulator, thus the result is a smoother steady flow of water from the accumulator under pressure to the misting nozzle. Secondly, another solution is to partially fill reservoir with water and sealing the reservoir and injecting the reservoir with high-pressure air (very similar to a traditional house garden insecticide spray tank with a hand air pump which also utilizes a small low flowrate spray nozzle that atomizes a fluid into a fine mist) with the nozzle output results much the same as the accumulator in Nelson above. Summarily, it would result in a much simpler to eliminate the accumulator or reservoir with the pressurized air/water interface, i.e. to simply use just a reservoir and a pump that pulls water from the reservoir and discharges the water directly to the misting nozzle.
The previously mentioned air/water interface is utilized in the above-mentioned prior art for Hillerson, Utter, and Strussion et al. (who utilizes a diaphragm pump bypass to lessen the pressure pulsating effect). The other solution to this issue that is really more indirect amounts to greatly increasing the flow rate through the nozzle and correspondingly reducing the pressure required on the upstream side of the nozzle that can allow a more conventional pump to the used, as in the identified prior art above for Porter and Coleman, however with this arrangement the effective cooling mist from the nozzle is lost, wherein the nozzle discharge more nearly resembles a spray of liquid (not atomized into a fine mist). Outside of the previously mentioned issues concerning the mist nozzle low flow rates and high pressures, evaporative water mist cooling especially for an individual in an outside environment is very attractive since the size and weight of the system can be kept minimal, there are low power requirements, and there are no environmental issues with CFC's and HCFC's. However, evaporative water mist cooling quickly loses its effectiveness in higher humidity environments which can be partially overcome with the use of colder water which enhances the evaporation and effective cooling process in high humidity environments by converting the evaporative water cooling process from having constant enthalpy to a partial heat energy reduction process.
What is needed, especially in the case of motorcycles is an efficient and effective portable cooling system due to the excess heat energy that is directed toward the motorcycle rider that is in addition to the ambient exterior environmental heat. This excess heat energy comes from the motorcycle engine itself, whether the motorcycle engine is air cooled or fluid cooled there is still a significant amount of heat energy coming from the engine cylinder and head cooling fins or from the radiator structure, unquestionably a portion of which is directed toward the motorcycle rider. In addition, on a hot sunny day, the reflection of solar heat energy from the black asphalt roadbed reflects upward toward the motorcycle rider and in heavy road traffic situations the excess heat energy from other vehicles engine radiators on the road that are in close proximity to the motorcycle rider further add to the total heat energy that the motorcycle rider is subjected to. Even though the motorcycle rider is not necessarily generating much in the way of metabolic body heat by nearly statically sitting on the motorcycle, except in the case of a motorcycle racing situation wherein the metabolic heat generated by the motorcycle rider could increase, the combination of motorcycle engine heat, road solar reflective heat, and other vehicle heat is significant for the motorcycle rider to be exposed to that is in addition to the ambient exterior environmental heat. It is important for the motorcycle rider from a safety and fatigue standpoint to remain comfortable and alert and not to suffer from any significant degree of heat exhaustion and fatigue, given that a motorcycle rider is typically fairly heavily clothed, i.e. leather jacket, leather gloves, leather boots, leather chaps or heavy weight denim pants, and possibly a helmet for protection from the elements and safety, thus making it difficult for the motorcycle rider to rid themselves of excess body heat. However, in the motorcycle rider's favor is the fact that when the motorcycle is traveling down the road the air velocity passing over the motorcycle rider in and of itself aids in cooling the motorcycle rider by the motorcycle rider's bodies perspiration that results in some limited form of evaporative cooling. Significantly, with the addition of an external fluid misting apparatus positioned in front of the motorcycle rider the air velocity passing over the motorcycle rider aids in expediting the evaporative cooling effect upon the motorcycle rider.
Thus, structurally what is desired for the motorcycle rider is a fluid misting apparatus that utilizes evaporative cooling as the most practical approach to keeping the motorcycle rider comfortable and alert on a hot day, wherein the apparatus would be adapted for use on the motorcycle by utilizing the electric pump that receives power from the motorcycle electrical system, with the pump drawing from a reservoir that can optionally be filled with ice water with the pump discharging directly to the mist nozzles, with the system effectively concealed from visual observation or designed as an aesthetic addition to the motorcycles appearance. Note that the pump would be selected so as not to require any flow or pressure control valving, accumulators, or any intermediate air/water interface reservoirs, so as to keep the apparatus as simple and reliable as possible.